How the Right Content Strategy Will Aid Your Inbound Marketing
An effective marketing strategy has many different components and moving parts working to attract your target audience and convince them to make a purchase.
Your goal is to identify how to move people through the sales funnel successfully. To do that, you need to leverage different marketing tactics that complement one another and ultimately help you convert leads into paying customers.
Inbound Marketing vs. Content Marketing
Marketing techniques such as inbound marketing and content marketing are often confused to be the same thing. In fact, inbound marketing is the process of attracting the attention of prospect while content marketing is how that’s achieved.
Inbound marketing is a customer-centered marketing strategy that provides potential customers with solutions to their current needs. It’s the process of attracting prospects’ attention by creating content designed to address their pain points. When done successfully, inbound marketing converts leads into paying customers, and you enjoy growth in your business. For inbound marketing to be successful, it needs a well-defined content marketing strategy.
Content marketing is viewed as a vital subset of inbound marketing. It involves content creation that is designed to meet the needs of the prospect at every stage of their buyer’s journey.
Because the inbound methodology is focused on attracting potential customers, the content created should be compelling. It should be characterized as high quality, informative, and relevant. It should include the right keywords and written with the purpose to help your buyer personas.
The Role Inbound Marketing Plays in the Buyer’s Journey
The content should address the specific pain points at each stage of the buyer’s journey. Specific types of content type work best for the awareness stage, the consideration stage, and decision stage of the buyer’s journey. A structured content marketing strategy should take those different stages into account.
Awareness Stage
Blog posts are the most common form of content for the awareness stage. It’s an accessible media format that is easy to find in a simple Google search. Videos and infographics are also easy-to-consume formats that work well during this stage.
Consideration Stage
At the consideration stage, people have a deeper understanding of their problem. However, they haven’t quite identified what the solution is. Content types that are ideal for the consideration stage of the buyer’s journey include eBooks, explainer videos, downloadable resources, guides, tip sheets, and SlideShares.
Decision Stage
As prospects enter the decision stage, they’re ready to buy. They’ve determined the category that will solve their problems but haven’t decided on what brand. At this stage, your content should be geared towards helping them decide that you are the right brand for them. Content types that can help you accomplish that are case studies, white papers, and reports.
In conclusion
The terms inbound marketing and content marketing are often mistakenly used synonymously. But while they are both components of an overall marketing plan, think of inbound marketing as the process and content marketing as the action. Ultimately, they have the same goal, and that’s to attract prospects and gain new customers.
At Curatti, we know how confusing it can get differentiating all these many marketing strategies. Contact and connect with us today, and we can help you make sense of it all.
You may also want to read: Why You Should Consider Outsourcing Your Content
3 Ways To Attract More Leads With Magnetic Content Marketing
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Jan Gordon
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